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Sunday, March 18, 2018

"Study space, not print editions, in demand" according to Jaime Adame, University of Arkansas Reporter.

Books fill the shelves Saturday in the Mullins Library on the University of Arkansas, Fayetteville campus.Photo: Andy Shupe

Renovations to the University of Arkansas, Fayetteville main campus
library will result in up to three-quarters of books and other printed
materials moving to a new off-campus storage facility.

The move comes as campuses nationally have seen declines in the
number of items being checked out, with UA also seeking to add more
group study space within Mullins Library to keep up with growing numbers
of students.

About 1.2 million books and other bound printed materials sit on the
shelves of the four-level, approximately 227,660-square-foot Mullins
Library, said Kathleen Lehman, head of user services for UA libraries.
She said the 1.2 million estimate leaves out some categories of printed
materials, including textbooks kept on reserve, a collection of books
for children, and oversized volumes.

An estimated 300,000 to 350,000 books and bound serials will remain
after items are transferred into storage, said Joel Thornton, head of
instruction and liaison services for UA libraries. Lehman said the
moving will begin as soon as this summer, while renovation work is
scheduled to begin in late 2018, according to information posted online
by UA.

"Many libraries in the U.S. are going through this exact same
process, or have been through it recently in the last five years," said
Carolyn Henderson Allen, dean of UA libraries.

The number of items checked out at UA -- including some materials
that are not books, such as DVDs -- decreased by about 49 percent in
academic year 2016-17 compared with four years earlier. In 2016-17,
initial circulations, not including renewals, totaled 31,320 across all
UA libraries, down from 60,964 in 2012-13.

The decreases in circulation took place even as UA's total number of
undergraduates increased to 22,548 in the fall of 2016 compared with
20,350 the fall of 2012. Last fall, UA enrolled 23,044 undergraduates
and a total of 27,558 students, according to university data...

The Special Collections Department houses items such as the collected
papers of former U.S. Sen. J. William Fulbright, as well as some
nonprint artifacts of historical interest. Some items will move to the
new storage facility, Lehman said.

However, as libraries evolve, the emphasis is more on such historical items than the sheer size of a collection, Lehman said.

"We're less of a warehouse for stuff that other people have, and try
to focus more on what can we provide that's unique," Lehman said.

In addition to special collections, at libraries it's now "more about
what journals do I have access to, how quickly can my request be
fulfilled," said Lehman, adding that there is greater emphasis on
utilizing networks of libraries to provide access to materials requested
by patrons.Read more...

Crystal Donaldson says, "Five second grade Cub Scouts collected close to 600 books as their first community service project of the year."

Pack 3957 donated 575 books to the nonprofit organization Books to Benefit.The pack said they wanted to promote literacy in the community.

Photo: courtesy Pixabay

President of the nonprofit, Jackie Langhoff, said Books to Benefit
will donate proceeds from their semiannual book sale to STAR Adult
literacy and YouthBuild McLean County literacy programs.“We also try to re-hone books that are of scholarly value to academic
and scholarly libraries across the united states,” she said.The semiannual sale will take place June 14-17.Source: WJBC News

The Greek gods look exactly like people because they are people,
glorified ancestors in the way of Cain, boasting of their exaltation of
humanity as the measure of all things in the post-Flood world. Despite
Socrates’ testimony that Zeus and Athena were his “ancestors,” this
significant interconnection has remained the overlooked key to
understanding our true origins—until now. (See www.genesisingreekart.com for the human genealogy of the gods). The 170 full-color ancient vase and sculpture images in this extraordinary book depict:

Zeus’ and Hera’s relation to the serpent-entwined apple tree

Cain killing Abel on the Parthenon

Seth-men as Centaurs seizing Cain-women as their wives (Genesis 6:2)

How the Greeks remembered Noah’s Flood • Naamah (Genesis 4:22), the Cain-woman who survived the Flood as Ham’s wife

Naamah/Athena consecrating her grandson Nimrod/Herakles to the way of Cain

Nimrod/Herakles usurping the authority of Noah/Nereus

The altar of Zeus in Pergamum as the throne of Satan from Revelation 2:13

Plato came from a wealthy, connected Athenian family and lived a
comfortable upper-class lifestyle until he met an odd little man named
Socrates, who showed him a new world of ideas and ideals. Socrates
taught Plato that a man must use reason to attain wisdom, and that the
life of a lover of wisdom, a philosopher, was the pinnacle of
achievement. Plato dedicated himself to living that ideal and went on to
create a school, his famed Academy, to teach others the path to
enlightenment through contemplation.

However, the same Academy that spread Plato’s teachings also fostered
his greatest rival. Born to a family of Greek physicians, Aristotle had
learned early on the value of observation and hands-on experience.
Rather than rely on pure contemplation, he insisted that the truest path
to knowledge is through empirical discovery and exploration of the
world around us. Aristotle, Plato’s most brilliant pupil, thus settled
on a philosophy very different from his instructor’s and launched a
rivalry with profound effects on Western culture.

The two men disagreed on the fundamental purpose of the philosophy.
For Plato, the image of the cave summed up man’s destined path, emerging
from the darkness of material existence to the light of a higher and
more spiritual truth. Aristotle thought otherwise. Instead of rising
above mundane reality, he insisted, the philosopher’s job is to explain
how the real world works, and how we can find our place in it. Aristotle
set up a school in Athens to rival Plato’s Academy: the Lyceum. The
competition that ensued between the two schools, and between Plato and
Aristotle, set the world on an intellectual adventure that lasted
through the Middle Ages and Renaissance and that still continues today.

From Martin Luther (who named Aristotle the third great enemy of true
religion, after the devil and the Pope) to Karl Marx (whose utopian
views rival Plato’s), heroes and villains of history have been inspired
and incensed by these two master philosophers—but never outside their
influence.

Accessible, riveting, and eloquently written, The Cave and the Light
provides a stunning new perspective on the Western world, certain to
open eyes and stir debate. Read more...

In this superbly illustrated volume, Athens and Rome, the two
greatest cities of antiquity, spring to life through the masterful pen
of Peter Connolly. For the first time ever, all the evidence has been
painstakingly pieced together to reconstruct the architectural wonders
of these mighty civilizations. By re-creating their public buildings,
their temples, shops, and houses, Connolly reveals every aspect of a
person's life in glorious detail, including religion, food, drama,
games, and the baths. The first part of The Ancient City covers the
development of Athens in the hundred years following the Persian Wars,
which began in the 4th century B.C. These chapters encompass the Golden
Years of Athens; the establishment of democracy; the building of the
Parthenon, the Erechtheum, and the municipal buildings of the Agora; a
typical Athenian workday; and the construction of the Long Walls.

Part II examines the development of Rome in the hundred years from
Nero (emperor of Rome from A.D. 54 to 68) to Hadrian (emperor of Rome
from A.D. 117 to 138)--the great building period of Rome. Visit Nero's
Golden Palace and the buildings subsequently built over it, the
Colosseum, the Flavian Palace, the Baths of Trajan, the Temple of Venus
and Roma, as well as other buildings such as the Circus Maximus, the
Theatre of Marcellus, and Trajan's Forum and Market. In addition to
reading about the great monuments and moments of classical Greece and
Rome, readers learn about a typical day in the life of an Athenian and a
Roman. They read about--and see--the houses people inhabited; attend
5-day festivals and go to the theatre; fight great battles and witness
the birth of Rome's navy; visit temples and spend a day at the races.
The fascinating artwork and vivid descriptions provide a window into the
great history of these two extraordinary cities and civilizations. Read more...

The UK is Europe’s leading App Economy country, with London being
Europe’s leading App Economy city. From carbon fibre to graphene;
microprocessor IP to IoT, UK Tech is in demand globally and account
for 46% of all exports from the UK creative industries. Also
home to 23 of the top 100 games development studios, the UK is at the
forefront of global trends - artificial intelligence, augmented
reality, massively multiplayer online games (MMOG / MMO), mobile games,
social, virtual reality. The UK is actively exploring the artistry of
Virtual Reality (VR) and creative storytelling to push technology
further. Trust British creative services to deliver your next big idea.Read more...

Artificial Intelligence (AI) is a hot topic in commerce marketing and
may be the fastest growing technology trend today. Experts believe AI
will have a huge impact on our daily lives, our interactions with one
another and the broader economy.Remember that technology is
simply a tool to expand and accelerate your own efforts. It’s the
combination of your team’s expertise and the technology you use to
automate marketing tactics that will win the day.Read more...

Learn various ways that Artificial Intelligence (AI) is changing the way
recruiters find, engage and screen candidates. AI is applied to
machines and algorithms that mimic the cognitive functions of human
beings. Although it does not and may never possess a “general
intelligence” like that of a human brain, AI machines are constantly
improving and evolving.

Wednesday, January 24, 2018

A friend asked me – with all the hoohah on “fake news” – got “fake statistics” or not?

Photo: The Online Citizen

Well, from my experience analysing statistics for the last two decades or so – “fake statistics” are very very rare.What we have are often:

no disclosure of the statistics

partial disclosure of the statistics

omitting statistics

changing the definition of the statistics

changing the time period of the statistics

not reporting statistics using international norms

changing the base population of the statistics

a combination of the above

Let me try to give some examples to illustrate the above.“no disclosure of the statistics” – the HDB does not
breakdown the price of HDB BTO flats into contruction, land and other
costs. All that we know is that land is charged at market rates“partial disclosure of the statistics” – the employment growth statistics are broken down into locals and foreigners, but not Singaporeans“omitting statistics” – the GIC’s annualised returns are for
up to 20 years in US$ – but not the annualised return from its
inception in S$. In contrast, Temasek also discloses its annualised
return from its inception in S$“changing the definition of the statistics” – a part-time
worker used to be defined as working not more than 30 hours a week –
this was changed to 35 hours. So, arguably, by the stroke of a pen –
both the categories of full-time and part-time workers’ median wages
increasedRead more... Source: The Online Citizen

"When life gives you lemons, you make lemonade. This was the
idiom young Sfundo Manyathi, a star achiever in the 2017 matric exams,
said most accurately summed up is life and, more particularly, the last
three years of high school" notes KwaZulu-Natal - IOL.

The confident pupil who recently matriculated from Star College in Durban, Sfundo Manyathi, who this year aims to pursue Actuarial Science at UCT. He scored a spectacular As in the NSC matric exams. Photo: Supplied

Sfundo told The Mercury of his journey to achieving top marks in the 2017 NSC exams.

“I
was given a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to meet with Star College,
which opened doors to a new and improved life for me,” said Sfundo. “I
was taken from a relatively poor township (Ntuzuma), where everything
was jovial and easy, to a place where everything was challenging and
serious.”

Sfundo said despite the independent school being the best thing that had happened to him, it presented a number of challenges.

One of those was trying to fit in, socially and academically.

“It
took a while for me to change my colours from street smart to
academically smart, making new friends all around the school and most
importantly, knowing and loving my teachers,” the charismatic student
said.

Sfundo was offered a full scholarship, free stay in the school’s dormitory, free books…

He
said people at the school were generous with help and emotional support
throughout his schooling there and he wanted to make his teachers
proud...

The principal, Osman Karayvaaz, said Sfundo was a great motivation and inspiration to other pupils.

"A
National Science Foundation-funded initiative aimed at expanding the
use of "active learning" techniques in introductory mathematics courses
is expanding from three to 12 universities, the Association of Public
and Land-grant Universities announced today" inform Doug Lederman, Editor at Inside Higher Ed.

The nine universities joining the effort are California State
University, East Bay; California State University, Fullerton; Kennesaw
State University; Loyola University; Morgan State University; Ohio State
University; the University of Maryland at College Park; the University
of Oklahoma; and the University of Texas Rio Grande Valley.

Kaggle released the raw survey data and many in the data science community have analyzed the data (see link above). I will be exploring their survey data over the next couple of months. When I find something interesting, I’ll be sure to post it here on my blog. Today’s post explores the difference among data professionals on their level of job satisfaction.

The Value of Job Satisfaction Job satisfaction is useful metric to study in business, often used to monitor and manage employee relationships.
There is much evidence supporting the utility of using job satisfaction
as a way to manage your business. For example, employees who are
satisfied with their job also perform better on the job and will likely stay on the job(lower turnover) compared to employees who are dissatisfied with their job. Additionally,satisfied employees deliver a better experience
to their customers compared to dissatisfied employees, ultimately
improving other organizational outcomes like productivity and profit...Job Satisfaction Varies by Data Science Job Title Results showed that data professionals are satisfied with their
current job (Mean = 6.8). I found that 75% of the respondents indicated
they were satisfied (ratings between 6 and 10 inclusive). Nearly 1 out
of 5 (19.4%) data professionals indicated that they were very satisfied
(ratings of 9 or 10) with their job. A quarter of the data professionals
said they were dissatisfied with their current job.

Tuesday, January 23, 2018

"Giri (my better half) always chides me for attempting to show things in
poor light. But I cannot help it, can I? Even as I plan my annual trip
to the US in February, I thought I must share certain happenings that
will definitely be in the interest of the larger public" continues Moneylife.

Photo: Moneylife

I know that
Moneylife stands in the forefront when it comes to issues such as these,
as part of its exemplary efforts in setting a new journalistic trend.

My nephew, who is based in Mumbai, was keen on his son pursuing a course
in actuarial science. He sought my help, since he, somehow, believed
that a seasoned academician like me will be of great help to him. I had
already forewarned him about my activist instincts. Despite being a
senior citizen, I have still managed to maintain my contacts in
academia. It always helps. Thanks to social media networks, I have
managed to stay connected.

As I began talking to one person after another, the real truth behind an
actuarial science course started coming to light. It was, indeed, a
shocker for me! Anyway, readers must have heard/ read about how an
actuary is a most sought after person in the insurance industry and how
actuaries draw huge sums of money as salaries and bonuses. Actuaries are
responsible for using statistical methods to compute the amount of
insurance premium. This is the main function of an actuary, though they
have other roles like risk modelling, etc.

When I contacted Satish Nair (not his real name) through one of my
acquaintances, he dropped a bombshell. Since pursuing an actuarial
science course from India was next to impossible (I will come to it
later), his daughter pursued a two-year actuarial science course from UK
wiping out half of Satish’s retirement funds. When she returned to
India, hoping to land a plum job, there were no takers. After waiting
for close to six months and twiddling her thumbs at home, Satish’s
daughter managed to get a job in an insurance call centre (of all
places) in Pune. Satish was fuming so much that if a kettle of cold
water had been kept before of him, it would have heated up in no time.

So where is the problem? Why is doing an actuarial science course in
India not such an exciting proposition? There are very few educational
institutions that impart an actuarial science course in India. Of these,
50% offer courses that are not recognised by the industry. Gullible
students get attracted to all the marketing nonsense being dished out by
these institutions and end up wasting money, time and effort. Some of
them end up ruining their career too.

Actually, there is a coterie that exists in an unofficial form. In one
of the well-known institutes in India’s business capital that offers an
actuarial science course, an outstanding student will take at least
seven years to get a degree in actuarial science after his
graduation—provided, he doesn’t lose interest halfway through the
course.

"AS Sijil Pelajaran Malaysia (SPM) school-leavers close one chapter in
their life and start another, they now face the daunting task of taking
the next step — choose the right course of study" summarizes Zulita Mustafa, Specialist Writer at New Straits Times.

After a
structured school system where students generally pursue either the
science or arts stream, how best can they decide on the field of study
and programme?A profession should be chosen with great care and
it should not be taken lightly. The decision is the first step towards
determining the path the future will take.A LEVELS OR FOUNDATION COURSESNurhanani
Hazamah Anuar, 20, prefers sitting exams similar to those in secondary
school and the Cambridge A Level (CAL) programme fits her requirements.

CAL is a 15- to 24-month programme and it is 100 per cent exam-based, so it is similar to SPM.

However,
unlike SPM where students usually sign up for nine subjects, CAL allows
a choice of a minimum of three subjects such as mathematics, further
mathematics, chemistry, physics, biology, economics, English literature,
law and accounting.

Nurhanani, a second-year student at Taylor’s
College, said it has been a relatively easy transition from secondary
school and she has also enhanced her soft skills and embraced the chance
of being the secretary of the CAL Student Council.

“Being involved in the council allows me to improve my skills in
communicating, critical thinking, problem-solving and collaborating,”
said Nurhanani, a Bank Negara scholar.

She plans to pursue a degree in accounting and finance at a university in the United Kingdom.

Another
CAL student Low See Nee, 20, said he was initially keen on the
Foundation of Science course at the International Medical University but
finally decided on the CAL programme at INTI.

“A relative, who is
an emergency department doctor, advised me to pursue the A levels
programme as it is internationally recognised and therefore allows me to
keep my options open.

“Besides, my focus is not only on academic
performance but also gaining a wider social network among students,”
said Low, who plans to pursue the Bachelor of Medicine, Bachelor of
Surgery (MBBS) programme at Monash University.

Antoine Xaverian
Bonaventure, 20, has had his eye on a career in the field of science
since secondary school, which influenced his decision to choose the
Foundation in Science programme at Taylor’s University.

“It
provides the most straightforward route to achieving my ambition to
become a doctor. The curriculum integrates e-learning tools and
interesting science projects so that students get exposure to basic
human anatomy and physiology.

“The foundation programme helps me to become a well-rounded student
who does not only excel academically but also in other areas.

“Since
I plan to pursue the MBBS programme at Taylor’s University School of
Medicine, the foundation course is the first step to reading medicine,”
said Antoine.

A foundation in science programme focuses on
science-related topics, concentrating on subjects such as mathematics,
physics, chemistry, biology and information technology.

The course not only prepares one to pursue medicine but also pharmacy and dental studies.

Originally from the small town of Cluny, in the Burgundy region of France, Philippe Rigollet made the move to MIT in 2014.

Photo: Bryce Vickmark

In 1996, when he was a high school senior in the small town of Cluny,
in the Burgundy region of France, Philippe Rigollet applied to several
of the two-year preparatory schools that most French students attend
before moving on to university. His transcript reported a stellar math
grade of 19.5 out of 20, but in the small space allotted for comments,
his math teacher had written “fainéant.”Rigollet translates that word as “slacker.”“They were really looking for slackers in those preparatory schools,”
Rigollet says. “They didn’t want people who were burned out at the end
of high school and couldn’t push it, because it was much harder.”“Slacker” is not an epithet that people tend to associate with MIT
professors, and Rigollet was tenured in the Department of Mathematics
last year. He is also part of MIT’s Institute for Data, Systems, and
Society. But in high school, Rigollet says, “I was not very disciplined
about learning stuff I didn’t want to learn.”

Fortunately, there’s a lot that he has wanted to learn. His work is
notable for its interdisciplinarity, moving back and forth between the
fields of statistics and computer science and bringing insights from
each to the other.Rigollet was born in a rural French town with a population of only
365. His mother was a speech therapist, and his father taught grades two
through five at the local elementary school. The 30-odd students in
those four grades shared a single classroom, and during math class,
Rigollet’s father would pose questions to each group in turn.“That’s where I got used to being good at math,” Rigollet says. “I
would try to listen to the harder questions from the upper class.”The community was predominantly agrarian — “Raising chickens was a
big thing,” Rigollet says — but his parents had a side line in
door-to-door sales of health, beauty, and home-care products for Amway.
Starting when Rigollet was 4, the family would attend Amway workshops in
the U.S. for a week or two almost every year.“That balanced out somehow the fact that I had a pretty limited
perspective from where I grew up — the fact that I got to visit the
United States,” Rigollet says.

“Going to the mall, having Taco Bell, it was just a dream for me.”It also explains why, despite being educated entirely in France,
Rigollet speaks such fluid, idiomatic English. “My first full sentence
was ‘Can I have change for the game room?’” he says.Mathematical freedomOn the strength of his placement exams, Rigollet earned a spot at a
prestigious preparatory school in Lyon, which specialized in math and
physics. He still had difficulty making himself learn stuff he didn’t
want to learn, however: He excelled in math, but in physics, “I was just
getting by,” he says.“In physics, the rules were set a little too strongly for me,” he
says. “Math allowed you more to have your own proof or your own way of
thinking. It’s funny, because some people look for structure in math,
and I’m looking for freedom. In what I’m doing now, I choose the model I
want, and I do the math I want, and I do the description I want of
these things.”...

For a statistician with an interest in computer science, however, a
department of operations research and financial engineering was never a
perfect fit. So in 2015, Rigollet moved to MIT. There he has continued
to pursue parallel research tracks in pure statistics and machine
learning. Some of his earliest work at MIT concerned statistical methods
that could be used to optimize both the design of clinical trials and
the targeting of ads to web users. More recently, he’s been
investigating statistical techniques for interpreting data produced by
the imaging technique known as cryoelectron microscopy, whose inventors
were awarded the 2017 Nobel Prize in Chemistry.Read more... Source: MIT News

Contact me

About Me

Hello, my name is Helge Scherlund and I am the Education Editor and Online Educator of this personal weblog and the founder of eLearning • Computer-Mediated Communication Center.
I have an education in the teaching adults and adult learning from Roskilde University, with Computer-Mediated Communication (CMC) and Human Resource Development (HRD) as specially studied subjects. I am the author of several articles and publications about the use of decision support tools, e-learning and computer-mediated communication. I am a member of The Danish Mathematical Society (DMF), The Danish Society for Theoretical Statistics (DSTS) and an individual member of the European Mathematical Society (EMS). Note: Comments published here are purely my own and do not reflect those of my current or future employers or other organizations.